What is Human Nature, Anyway?

On NPR this morning, there was a piece on the global campaign to get people to stop texting while driving. In case you didn't know it or couldn't see it coming, this is now a worldwide safety issue. There is apparently a very graphic and troubling YouTube video making the rounds that aims to be an effective PSA against this practice. It targets teens, who are already a fairly menacing group when it comes to driving. One interviewee claimed that, though the video is deeply disturbing, it won't change viewers' behavior. It won't get them to stop texting while driving. I agree. Ask the geniuses who came up with the "Just Say No" campaign. Changing human behavior is tricky business.

This got me thinking … about marketing and advertising, about teens and peer pressure, about culture and coolness, and mostly about all of the things we assume we know about human behavior. This last one really sparked a chain of thought that I just had to share. We assume that it's human nature to take advantage when given the chance. We assume that it's human nature for teens to only think about their own desires in the moment and not consider the consequences. We assume that peer pressure will outweigh parental preferences, or at least intelligent decision-making in teenagers.

There are countless studies that back up these assumptions. However, all of these studies were performed with subjects raised within a predominantly authoritative parenting culture. We think parenting styles have changed over the years, but in reality, most of those changes have been minor tweaks within an ongoing, overarching paradigm that has been passed from generation to generation. The dominant culture still values obedience and deference to authority. We tell ourselves that our children must learn to respect authority and follow rules in order to be successful in the real world. Thus, the real world of our grandparents is perpetuated, through the generations, with updates in technology, style, and vocabulary. Look at the slew of parenting books! The overwhelming majority of them (Alfie Kohn is one glowing exception) offer shiny new strategies to help you get your kids to do what you want. The name of the game is obedience, no matter how it's disguised. And so we watch our youth rebel, over and over again, until they succumb to the real world, and then inflict it on their children.

People take advantage. Teens are impulsive and inconsiderate.

We call these traits human nature. We say it's the way people are.

I say that's a cowardly and short-sighted assumption. The way people are is affected tremendously – TREMENDOUSLY - by how they are raised. How they are raised is mostly dependent on how their parents were raised. Unless a parent is brave enough to go against family dynamics AND the dominant culture, they will recreate the same parenting cycle of domination, rebellion, and submission.

Ask most parents why they send their kids to preschool and you'll get some variation of, "So they can start learning how to take turns, stand in line, and sit quietly in a classroom." You know, to prepare them for kindergarten, grade school, high school, college, and … the real world. Obedience. Order. Respect for authority. This is certainly not why I'm sending my child to preschool, and if it starts to look like this, I'll pull him out faster than you can say, "classroom rules." Are we really to assume that without this training, our children will become anarchists? Please.

I'm certainly not suggesting we abandon all discipline. Quite the contrary. Clear boundaries and expectations create safety for kids. Consistency is crucial for them to learn what is and is not safe and appropriate. This can be accomplished without resorting to fear and manipulation, though. When we show our kids the respect they deserve, we get cooperation instead of obedience. We get intelligent discussion instead of rebellion, and we get empowered young adults instead of approval-hungry automatons ready to swallow the blue pill of the status quo.

I see more and more parents waking up and taking the courageous step of parenting consciously, in the best way they know how. It's very difficult when the bulk of society wants to pull us back into its old paradigm, but we're feeling our way through it, supporting one another, and trusting our children to guide us. I see more and more alternative education programs that focus on collaboration instead of competition, innovation instead of repetition, and nurturing children's innate gifts, instead of labeling anyone outside the narrow band of "normal" with a learning disability.

When these kids come of age and become the voice of the new mainstream culture, I wonder what will then be said about human nature. I imagine it will be something quite different than what we assume today.